Dysfunctional Family Values
by Fenrir's Daughter
Summary: It's a white trash family reunion when Vert's uncle Chris shows up in Handler's Corners after Sheriff Johnson arrests his brother and father! Naturally, he tells the BF5 some family stories and embarrasses the hell out of Vert...


A/N: Now that the angst fest that is Big Bad Cop has finally come to a close, I give you an attempt at comedy. Dark comedy, but still a comedy that takes place After Missing Mom, but before Spinner's Day Out. I really gotta pin down a timeline for my stories.

For those of you who came here from the very neglected Titus section, I bid you welcome and I apologize for the intrusion. For those of you who came from the small but fanatical Battle Force 5 section, O HAI GAIZ I HAS A CROSSOVER. Titus was a sitcom that ran three seasons on Fox that ran so close to star/writer/producer/director Christopher Titus' life his family had to sign waivers. The show was based on the standup comedy of Christopher Titus, most notably his special "Norman Rockwell Is Bleeding." Almost all of Titus' dialogue in this is based heavily if not outright ripped off from that special, as well as "The 5th Annual End Of The World Tour" and "Love Is Evol."

* * *

When Vert stumbled into the diner at five in the morning, you could have knocked him over with a feather. Bad enough he was exhausted; bad enough his team had been battling weird mutant animals and killer robots all through the night to keep the Earth safe from interdimensional squid or whatever. Handler's Corners was a small Nevada town he called home. This was where he lived and worked, where he fought valiantly to save the world. He had so many memories in this town. He had gone to school and made friends—and enemies, truth be told. But his parents were from this town, and he had grown up here. Handler's Corners was small and quiet in terms of social life and too much trouble in a galactic sense, but it was his home and he had no intention of leaving it.

But the last time he had seen the tall blonde man at the counter, he had tried to take Vert away from all that. Seeing Titus left him completely gob-smacked. It was not terribly often he got to see any of his family members, and that was the way Vert liked it. It saddened him that his father was drifting through the multiverse and that his mother was remanded to an insane asylum, and until Sage and the rest of his friends had come along, he had been very lonely. But there were some relatives he could not abide by, certain sides of the family that were to be avoided at all cost.

"Uncle Chris?" he managed to stammer once he had caught the annoyed gaze of the middle-aged man. His friends had piled in to their usual booth and only Agura was interested enough to look their way. "Uncle Chris, what are you doing here?"

Christopher Titus sipped his coffee in a surly manner, barely acknowledging his estranged nephew. It had been a while since the many-years sober Californian had needed to pull an all-nighter and he was not looking forward to the day at hand. "Nice to see you too, Vert," he said sarcastically.

"Uh, yeah, nice to see you, Uncle Chris. You look great."

"Yeah, I lost twenty-eight pounds since the divorce. Apparently that's how much a soul weighs."

Vert flinched. "Sorry," he muttered. "Are you okay?"

Chris looked at him skeptically for a moment, but changed his expression to a blank mask. "Well, let's see," he said, counting off on his fingers. "I got called out of bed four hours ago to bail my idiot brother out of jail, got turned away by the hick sheriff on a power-trip who insists I come in when 'proper visiting hours' start. So I've got three hours before I can grab Dave—and _Dad,_ because he tried to bail Dave out while _drunk._ Then I have to drive hell-bent-for-leather back to Santa Barbara for my divorce hearing at ten where my ex will spew vicious lies about what a heartless monster I am." He finally paused to gasp for breath, throwing his hands up in exasperation. "Which I will probably be _late_ for if not outright _miss_ because I was dumb enough to try to help out my fucked up family when I already had my own problems."

By now Chris had raised his voice a bit, and Agura was not the only one fascinated by their conversation. Stanford casually glanced their way attempting to eavesdrop discreetly, whereas Spinner just leaned over his younger but much larger brother and curiously stared. Even Zoom had an ear open.

Titus clutched his hands in front of himself, turning to Vert with bright eyes and an overly cheery smile.

"And how are _you,_ oh dearest most darling nephew of mine?"

"Okay, okay, you're having a crappy time. I get it! Enough with the sarcasm, jeez…"

Chris sighed. "Sorry, sorry, didn't mean to rant. Just…it's been rough." He inhaled deeply and then exhaled slowly, trying to relax. "How have you been, Vert? You never call."

"Neither do you."

"And here we are."

In the awkward silence that ensued, Chris surveyed the odd assortment of teens in what looked like racing suits, all of which, upon closer inspection, matched the unusual vehicles parked outside. He had heard from the waitress, who was attractive to the point he had to remind himself he was old enough to be her father, that Spectra Motors was doing some strange and interesting things. She even said there was a rumor they had military contracts. If Jack had been around, he would have been deeply proud of what his son was doing.

Jack. Damn, that man had not crossed his mind in years. The weekend he was last seen alive, Spectra Motors and Titus High Performance were both to participate in a race. But Jack never made it to California. No one knew what happened to Jack, or if he was even alive. And poor Vert looked so much like his long lost father that it hurt just to look at him.

Agura stared expectantly as Grace came with their orders. "Vert, aren't you going to introduce us?"

"Huh?" Vert blinked rapidly, smacking his forehead. "Right, right, of course! Guys, this is my uncle, Christopher Titus. Uncle Chris, these are my friends Agura, AJ, Sherman, Spinner, Stanford, Tezz, and Zoom."

"Nice to meet you all," Chris said halfheartedly, not even bothering to make a snarky comment about his nephew's alphabetical introduction of his friends.

Zoom smiled eagerly. "So, you're not a Wheeler? Are you from Vert's mom's side?"

"Nah—Zoom, was it? No, Zoom. Me and Jack are half-brothers. I was from Dad's first marriage and…" He counted off on his fingers again. "…Juanita, Anne…Carol! Yeah, Dad's third wife. That's right."

"Third?" Zoom asked with raised eyebrows. "That's a lot."

"Please! Ken Titus was divorced and remarried five times. Until I was ten, I thought women were rent to own."

Agura bristled, but said nothing.

Chris laughed. "Oh, man, and when they split? They would clean his ass _out_, every time! I remember one point, we were so poor all we had left in the house was a wooden crate, a twelve inch black and white TV and a four man rubber raft for a couch! I have no idea how he did it." He laughed again, finishing with a sad sigh and leaning back on the counter while Grace refreshed his coffee. "Ah, divorce. So much funnier when it's happening to other people."

Vert gave an apologetic smile. "Sorry to hear about you and Erin. You guys seemed so happy together."

"Exactly! I should've known it'd never last," Titus said, waving his hand dismissively. "She had that Irish temper, y'know? Except she was _Northern_ Irish so we didn't fight—she'd just put a bomb in my car."

"Holy shit! Really?" Spinner squawked; if the newcomer had not held the team's attention before, he sure did now.

"No! …Well, there was that one time. Women. Why do we stay with these life-sucking vampires, man? These soul-crushing humps that just drag you through psychological barbed wire day after day, year after year—! Sorry, ranting again." Vert's uncle shook his head. "So, how are things in this one horse town? Oh, hey! Have they made any progress on your father's missing person case?"

"Actually, we found him."

"Holy shit! Really?"

"Yeah," Vert said fondly. "It'll be a while before he can come home, but Dad's alive. It's a miracle."

Christopher Titus laughed good and hard. It felt nice after so much time in the doldrums, being miserable about his brother and father and his own impending divorce. "Jack, you crazy son of a bitch. I shoulda known you'd be too stubborn to quit on us." He grinned at his nephew. "First thing I do when I see him is rag on him for missing the race. Then I'm going to punch him for being gone so long. Then I'm going to buy him a drink!"

Vert smiled. "I'm sure he'd appreciate that."

AJ smiled at the older man. "So, Mr. Titus, it seems like you've got some time to kill. Would you like to join us for breakfast?"

Titus sighed, smiling gently. "Why not? Day's already fucked, I might as well laugh about it now."

The BF5 made room for Titus at their table. Vert's friends asked him a few seemingly innocuous questions as he waited for Grace to bring his order, and almost immediately got the lowdown on Christopher Titus' messed up family life. While Jack had been adopted by his mother's second husband and started a relatively normal life in Handler's Corners, both Christopher and Dave had been 'fortunate' enough to stay with their father, Ken Titus, in Santa Barbara. Their boozing, brawling, womanizing, politically incorrect father. Chris and Dave only reconnected with younger brother, Jack when their high school years were coming to an end and his was just beginning. Jack's mother had wanted to get him away from a local girl for the summer to stop a budding romance and sent him to California—yeah, that worked _real_ well; that girl turned out to be Vert's mom. But for that summer, however, the three brothers had caroused and generally messed around as a form of male bonding. Chris, Dave, and Jack drank, stole cars, and partied 'til dawn, and their father only really seemed to care if they got caught. Those were some good times for the Titus clan.

"We weren't bad kids," he rationalized. "We just pulled a lot of pranks! …That happened to be felonies." While Uncle Chris launched into another tale from those insane teen years, Agura asked the obviously flummoxed Vert if he would like to get some air. Much obliged, he followed her outside.

"So what's the story behind that?"

"Story behind what?" Vert asked innocently. "There's no story there. Nope, no story at all."

Agura gave him a skeptical look. "Be honest, Vert. You weren't acting as standoffish as you were when we found your father in the Clockwork Zone, but you're still pretty edgy. What's up?"

Vert sighed, running a hand through his hair. With his mother's release from Brush Hollow imminent, it was bound to come out eventually. Agura had trusted him through all their missions. She would understand.

"Okay. So, after Dad went missing, Mom…had a bit of a breakdown. Social services said she was unfit and I had to go stay with Uncle Chris for a while."

Agura's eyes were wide. "Oh, Vert, I had no idea! I'm so sorry…"

"No, it's okay. You didn't know." Vert smiled weakly. "Uncle Chris and his wife really seemed to love each other, even when they fought like cats and dogs. He and Erin already had Erin's niece, Amy, staying with them, but they still took me in. Amy was kinda…troubled. It wasn't terrible, but it kinda sucked." The blonde's weak smile turned into a frown. "First chance I could, I got myself declared a legal adult and came back to Handler's Corners to live on my own. Anything was better than cohabitating with those clowns."

Agura felt guilty. She never meant to dredge up such awful memories. She put a hand on his shoulder. "Hey, it couldn't have been that bad, right?"

"The Titus family takes 'white trash' to a whole new level," Vert said cynically. "I'd really hoped you guys never had to meet any of them."

"Yeah, so the 'rent to own' comment was kind of misogynistic. I've heard worse on elementary school playgrounds."

Vert regarded her in stunned silence, his mouth agape in disbelief. "My God, you have no idea what you've gotten into."

Slightly creeped out, Agura followed her usually fearless leader back into the diner.

* * *

"—And I don't even know where we _got_ a telephone pole! I mean, a telephone pole may not be top of the list on the drunken theft scale, but it's _up_ there!"

AJ regretted inviting Titus to their table. He had never imagined his friend's uncle would be so bitter! But the second he spotted the leader of the Battle Force 5 he forced a smile and he waved Vert over, ignoring the way his friend cringed; maybe the blonde could do some damage control and shut the guy up. "There you are, bruh! Your uncle was just telling us about how he stopped drinking!"

"Yeah, you're done drinking then," he said soberly. "Forget AA. Falling into a bonfire is a one-step program."

Stanford chuckled, calmly sipping on his soda. "Sounds like that party turned into a real zoo."

"Oh, you think you know about zoos?" Titus leered. "Let me _tell_ you about the zoo…"

* * *

_The small blonde child struggled in his father's arms, desperate to keep his grip. "Dad, I don't wanna fight the monkey!" he cried out, clutching at the old man's shirt sleeves._

_But the father had no sympathy. "You don't have to fight the monkey, kid," he rationalized. "Just get my lighter back!"_

_"But dad—!"_

_"Don't be a wussy, Christopher!"_

_Without further ado, ten year old Christopher Titus was dropped screaming into the monkey enclosure at the San Diego Zoo. The simians immediately set upon the outsider, and he cried out in fear. Ken Titus looked down on him from above. "Okay, now you gotta fight the monkey," he nonchalantly drawled. Eager for a cigarette, he fidgeted and glanced around. Presently he noticed an Asian couple looking on him in horror. He glared at them; his only justification of his actions was to shrug his shoulders and rhetorically ask, "What?"_

_"No fair!" Ken's eight year old son Dave intoned. "How come Chris gets to fight the monkey? I wanna fight the monkey!"_

_Ken looked at Dave incredulously. Dave had been his second wife's son from a previous marriage, and when she left Ken, she left the little redhead behind and disappeared. Ken had done the right thing and adopted the neglected boy. Though he loved Dave as his own, it still struck Ken how slow on the uptake he was. "Really, Dave?" he asked, still unbelieving. "Really?"_

_"Yeah!"_

_Ken shook his head, lifting the boy over the fence. "Okay, but remember: you asked for it."_

_"Whee!"_

_Four year old Jack Titus, Ken's youngest by his third and still current wife, sucked his thumb, trying to blend in with the bushes. Jack did not like it when his father got like this. Daddy was big and yelled a lot and made Mommy sad. It was scary._

_Ken looked down at the remaining child. "How about it, Jack? Do you want to fight the monkey, too?"_

_"No, thank you," he said in a very quiet voice. "I'll just watch the idiots."_

_Ken laughed and ruffled his hair. "Clever boy."_

* * *

Stanford stared at the surly blonde man who sat sipping coffee before them. "You're joking. That can't possibly—_who _would do that to a _child?"_

"My dad," Uncle Chris said. "True story."

"But that's _insane_ and evil!"

Chris Titus regarded the redhead with the British accent. Like Chris' brother Dave, the royal was a little slow on the uptake. But the middle aged washout decided Stanford was more like his friend Tommy; he had been privileged enough to grow up in a stable, loving home and had never gone without. He had never realized that his father was a raging alcoholic. He had never called off his wedding because his mother shot and killed a man in the back of the church. He was 'normal,' as society would claim. He was 'sensitive' and 'civilized' and probably had never had to deal with half the shit the Titus clan had gone through.

"Maybe you're right, Pip," he said, ignoring the redhead's insistence that his name was indeed Stanford Isaac Rhodes. "But consider this: The Los Angeles Times reports that sixty three percent of families are now dysfunctional. That means _we're_ the majority. We're normal! It's the people like you, the people who grew up with a mommy and a daddy and a white picket fence—you people are the _freaks_! When the world ends, the normal people are gonna lose their goddamned minds. And you know what us sixty three percent are going to do?"

"What?"

"We're gonna say, 'Hey, nobody's watching the Lexus dealership!'" Chris laughed. "That's the great thing about being screwed up. Nothing rattles me! I drove my drunk father to my mother's parole hearing. When I was _twelve._ After that, what else is there?"

"Oh, Mr. Titus. You're father sounds positively horrid."

"Hey! My dad may not be perfect. He never missed a drink, or a cigarette, or a joint, or a party, or a chance to get laid. But he never missed a day of work, either, and we never went without, even though sometimes he would so we wouldn't have to." He paused long enough that his nephew thought he was actually saying something profound. But the moment was ruined, as Uncle Chris punctuated the statement with an insult. "So shove it up your ass, ya limey fruitcake."

If Stanford had been wearing a monocle it would have presently popped off his face and landed in his drink. "Well, I never!"

Titus was about to say something along the lines of 'You never what, kissed a girl?' But just then the door of the diner swung wide open. He could hardly believe his eyes: Dave and Dad were both being forcibly shoved through the doorway by an exasperated looking sheriff.

"Titus!" Dave cried jubilantly. But just a moment later he ignored his brother in favor of young Zoom. Dave always had a certain affinity for lithe, beautiful Asian chicks. "Hey, there, gorgeous!"

The Muy Thai warrior frowned. "Uh, thanks, but I'm not into dudes."

Dave nodded casually, grinning. "Lesbian. Niiiiiiice."

"Dude! I'm a guy!" Zoom yelled indignantly.

"Seriously?" Dave looked the young man up and down. "Well, you're a really _hot_ guy."

"I'm also _underage,_ creep."

"I never touched her, officer!" Dave said, walking away with his hands in the air. Zoom stayed in his seat, scowling deeply.

Sheriff Johnson groaned. "I can't take any more of this! They're drivin' me crazy! Get them outta my town, pronto!"

Vert watched Uncle Chris smirk and cross his arms, as if he cared not either way.

"Fifty bucks," Titus intoned.

Vert could not believe his ears! Did Christopher Titus seriously have the stones to demand payment up front from the sheriff to take his own father and brother off his hands? But the moment Sheriff Johnson grumbled and went for his wallet, the blonde was in for a deeper shock.

"Each," Titus clarified.

"What?" Sheriff Johnson yelled. "Are you crazy?"

"Hey, you want me to take 'em back to Cali or not?"

Growling in frustration, the sheriff paid Titus what was owed to him. He insisted they leave town in the next ten minutes before he changed his mind and took them all in, but for now he let them off with a warning. Just like that, he was out the door, glad to be rid of them.

Ken Titus, hard partying patriarch of the Titus clan glowered at his firstborn son. "Christopher! Did you just gain our freedom by extorting an officer of the law for cash?"

Chris looked off to the side, momentarily pondering this question before replying. "…Yes?"

"Clever boy," Papa Titus said with a grin. "I've never been more proud."

"Well, you're about to be even _more_ proud, Dad. Because I'm going to be on time for my divorce hearing, and I'm gonna win! Erin won't know what hit her!"

"See, ya say that now…" Papa Titus muttered.

Christopher Titus clapped his nephew on the back as he made his way out the door. Papa Titus sidled behind him, laughing maniacally. It was time to go. But as Dave waved and grinned in a friendly matter, Spinner momentarily stopped him.

"Dude, this is gonna bug me all day if you don't tell me," he said. "Just between us? What were you arrested for?"

Dave looked slyly about the room and leaned down to whisper. Spinner looked at him incredulously as the dimwitted redhead waggled his eyebrows suggestively. With a silly grin and finger guns, Dave ran backwards out the door, cheering as he hopped into the back of his brother's car. And just like that, Vert's extended family was gone.

Vert turned to his friends, thinking how exactly to phrase what he wanted to say. All the embarrassing stories his uncle had told, and all the politically incorrect things his relatives had said and done—Papa Titus' hand print was still on Grace's ass, for crying out loud! All the time that had been wasted having to deal with those ingrates… The rest of the BF5 must have been so upset, he thought. Finally, the blonde decided simplest was best.

"I am so, so sorry!" he gushed. "You guys shouldn't have had to put up with that. Agura, I'm sorry about Uncle Chris' comments and that they were even here! If I had any idea—"

"Vert, chill!" Agura grabbed the distraught young man by his shoulders. Sometimes, even though they were fighting a war, even though he was so wise and strong in the heat of battle, it amazed her how fragile he could be. "Calm down. It's okay. A lot of people have family members they're not proud of."

"Like Simon!" Stanford interjected. "Though I think he'd be terrified of your grandfather."

He sulked. "They're just so white trash…"

"And you're not. We're not going to judge you based on them." She smirked. "If anything, having to suffer those idiots explains why you're so level-headed and capable."

He grudgingly agreed. After a few more reassurances from his friends, Vert was able to smile again. So what if his relatives were a little dysfunctional? Friends are the family you choose, and he had a pretty good family right here. To hell with it! He deserved to be happy.

Sitting down with his friends—no, his family—to finally finish breakfast, Vert sipped his soda and glanced at Spinner. "So, what did Dave say he was in for?"

"Apparently," Spinner said, shaking his head, "Dave got high and thought it would be a good idea to break onto a ranch and paint the horses in rainbow colors. The only reason he gave was 'because ponies.' No offense, Vert, but your uncle's a dumbass."

The Battle Force 5 shared a hearty laugh. They may have been thrown together by the wars in the battle zones, but they were the family they chose.

* * *

A/N: YAY! FINALLY POSTED! I've been tweaking this for like a month! Please review!


End file.
